Radio host accuses Aunty of forcing her out

Barrister-turned-ABC broadcaster Susanna Lobez yesterday accused her employer
of trying to force her to quit by offering her an inappropriate job on her return
from adoption leave.

Lobez has taken the ABC to the Australian Industrial Relations Commission
to try to win back the position she held as presenter of The Law Report
on Radio National before taking unpaid leave as an adoptive parent.

The ABC has offered her a position as a reporter-producer on Radio National's
Asia Pacific segment. But Lobez told the commission that the position
of "fourth banana" on the segment was not comparable to the position she had
left, which had since been permanently filled by another legally qualified broadcaster,
Damien Carrick. Lobez said she had been hired by the ABC in 1993 as a legal
expert after responding to an advertisement for a qualified barrister.

She said she considered herself a specialist broadcaster, a term the ABC also
used to describe her in marketing material and in internal performance reviews.

"If it's not a botch-up or a communications stuff-up, it must be some . . .
attempt to force me into an inappropriate job in the hope I will quietly leave,"
she said while cross-examining ABC radio director Sue Howard.

Ms Howard denied there had been any attempt to force Lobez out of the ABC.

"We're not offering you the job of your dreams but nobody is trying to get
rid of you," Ms Howard said. "We have a job for you."

Ms Howard said the ABC regularly moved staff into new positions, with or without
their consent. However, she was unable to give examples of staff who had been
moved against their wishes.

Ms Howard said that although she personally believed Lobez was the best person
to present The Law Report, the management of Radio National wanted Lobez's
replacement to remain in the position because ratings had increased.

Lobez has not returned to work at the ABC since resuming unpaid leave last
July.

"You offered me a job and what I had was a career," Lobez told Ms Howard.